PEACE

Lord, not Thy work, the World's calamities,
But Man's. If Human Will revolt from Thine,
It flees Thy region, where the stars all shine
With longing to let down the Azure's Peace--
To dash its hosts from summits into seas,
Where Empires are the breakers. There the brine
Is anguish, and there Triumph leaves no sign,
Save wreck on rock, and Plague, adrift on breeze.

When Nations turn from Light, in thought, or life,
Their speed is brink-ward, save Thy Mercy stay;
For all is precipice, except Thy way.
Help, Lord, for here is heightening surge of strife;
Here, clouds turn floods, coasts are wind-whirled, like spray,
And lightenings, hurling back thy light, are rife.

RELIGION

Religion is Ascension. 'Tis the flights
Of souls to summits of the true and wise.
One, witnessing the generations rise,
Sees them a shine at countless, different heights,
Where they, responding to their inner lights,
Glow, like the clouds at morn, with graded dyes.
If summits, there are depths; if virtue, vice;
Hence, 'tis life's rise from falls, that judgment sights.

Witnessed, or not, there is no age, nor climb,
But souls arise as bloom, where earth is treed;
As warm, red rays, where cold from mountaining need;
As burst and spread of planets, where dark crime;
Nay, rise to poise above the star's top speed
To God, like larks, in praise for life and time.

THE GOLDEN JUBILEE OF SISTERS OF CHARITY

I

How thy Half Century shines over head!
'Tis an unfading rain-bow, one whose dyes
Are richer and more numerous to the eyes
Of Angels, than to ours. Its rays, if spread
Above a flood of sin and world of dead,
Give to the drowned, new life, new earth, new skies.
Night counts her stars, but falters, when souls rise
Bright with the Grace which God's annointed shed.

Belov'd Irene, how great our joy to see
Thine arch, aglow with virtue's every hue!
Oh, how much more must they rejoice, who view
From inner Heaven, the arch that is for thee,
Triumphal! for than vows like thine, lived true,
No grander arch from earth to heaven could be.

II

The "Church Triumphant" shines in lives like thine,
Calista! 'Tis the Saints' procession, shown
In Dante's vision, near Lord Jesus' throne,
In greatening splendor, never to decline.
Ah, if ou